


A Bit of Help

by botgal



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Caliginous Romance | Kismesis, F/M, If You Squint - Freeform, Sick Character, hints of flushed feelings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-12
Updated: 2017-02-12
Packaged: 2018-09-23 21:51:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,985
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9680471
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/botgal/pseuds/botgal
Summary: When Vriska falls too sick to hunt, she fears for her life as her troll-eating lusus grows impatient. When she fears she's at the end of her rope, she makes one last-ditch plea for help to avoid a gruesome fate.She just never expected the answer to it would come from her kismesis.





	

Vriska was almost completely certain she was going to die.

It hadn't started off bad. Just a sniffle one morning after a long night of FLARPing. She hadn't thought much of it at the time. There had still been things to do. Feed her gargantuan arachnid caretaker the day's catch of trolls, shower off the brine and blood, check how all her figurative irons were doing in the proverbial fire. Then it had just been right off to her coon before the sun rose.

When she awoke the next night she had a headache and her nose completely stuffed up. Then it had progressed, worsening until her feverishness made everything all fuzzy, she was going through tissues like her neighbor went through milk glasses, and everything she ate came right back up the way it went in. She could hardly hold anything more than a slice of plain grubloaf at a time. It hadn't been too worrisome for a bit, but as it got worse, her lingering thoughts turned to her lusus.

Spidermom ate a lot, but at least it was at long intervals. She could go a few days without getting antsy about a meal after a good feeding like her last one. But by the time night three had come and gone and she could barely move past her own food block, fear started to creep in fully.

She had considered sending out a couple of messages to ask for help, but quickly decided against it. If she actually asked for help, she would just look weak, and that was not a word she would have anyone associating with the name Vriska Serket. Not like any of them could handle it anyway. They were all a bunch of weaklings, none of them would be willing to kill another troll, even to help her.

Well, maybe there was one, but there was no way she was going to ask her kismesis for help.

Even so, when her condition suddenly took an even sharper downturn, and she still hadn't been able to go out hunting for her lusus after five days, the idea of weakness seemed suddenly a lot paler in comparison to the idea of death. Her skin shivered with both chills and with goosebumps of fright. She could hear the threatening clicking of sharp mandibles and soft hisses, so faint she wasn't certain if they were coming from her imagination or the web-covered bottom of the canyon far below. Too dizzy and nauseous to walk properly, she stumbled her way to her husktop, still dripping with green slime clinging to her skin and hair.

She could hardly focus on the glowing screen in front of her, but clicked on the first flashing name she saw. Someone had been leaving her a lot of messages. Whoever they were, it seemed they were the most recent one to message her. She had to take the chance that they were still online and, if not willing to help her themselves, then at least get ahold of someone who could.

Vriska did her best to ignore the pangs in her empty stomach, the dryness of her throat. Her stomach was so volatile at the moment that the last time she'd tried to eat something she had thrown it back up almost immediately. Even plain water wasn't going down properly, her throat felt so coarse. Ignoring all those, and the dark spots that invaded her vision as she tried to focus, she quickly typed out a series of messages.

Her head was hurting and her hands felt shaky. She was pretty sure that she was making enough typos that half of her words would be illegible to whoever was getting this. But she wrote out all she could think of. About her illness, her lusus, her inability to hunt. Even her fear, she was past most all caring at this point. Above her pride of everything she didn't want to _die_.

A loud noise that seemed to be close enough to her window caught her attention, and she stood up too quickly from her chair. Dark spots took over her sight as a stab of pain flared up behind her eyes. She stumbled backwards, then felt the heel of her foot catch over the top of something round. She hardly had time to cry out as she toppled over backwards, head slamming hard into the floor in a blow that sent her vision completely black and her body limp.

–

When next Vriska awoke, she almost thought she was dead. She actually felt comfortable, relaxed. Certainly a lot better than before. She actually felt a bit hungry, now her stomach no longer felt like it was turning itself inside-out in her abdomen. More than anything, she was actually pretty thirsty.

She was feeling suspicious, though, the more awake she felt. Last she remembered she fell over something, probably a stupid magic 8 ball. Yet now, she was laid out in her recuperacoon, comfortable and much better. Even her clothes were changed out. But she didn't know how...

The door to her respite block creaked open, and Vriska splashed around weakly in the sopor, trying to peek out over the edge.

“Well, looks like you're finally awake. Bout time.” She knew that voice. Vriska barely managed to prop herself up against the edge of the coon when she saw her kismesis approach. He had a tray with some water and a big of grubloaf, along with a couple of pills, balanced in one hand. “Least now I don't have to force this shit down your protein chute myself.”

“...Eridan?” Her voice came out in a confused croak, rubbing at her eyes to try to clear away the sleep and slime.

“Well done, Vris, you've managed to accomplish remembering my name.” He set the tray down hard with a jarring clatter, and picked up the water and the medicine. “Here, take these before you do anything else. Try to drink down all the water, you're probably dehydrated from all that sleeping. I could only get so much into you while you were so delirious.”

While under normal circumstances Vriska would be a lot more hesitant about accepting anything from him... well, these weren't exactly normal circumstances, were they. She took the pills from him and brought them to her mouth, then shakily took the water and used it to wash them down. After about half the glass had been drained, she accepted a few bites of grubloaf. It was only after the water had been drained and her throat felt a bit better that she spoke again.

“The hell are you even doing here, Eridan?” She watched him as he put the remainder of the stuff back down on the tray. “How did you get past my lusus?” She knew he had his skyhorse lusus, but even Seahorsedad would be hard pressed to avoid Spidermom if she decided to climb up the cliff unless they just flew back away completely.

“Well after fucking _days_ of being AWOL and not a word from you, I was trying to send messages because you missed our campaign days. Had to do em all on my own, you know. The lowbloods were a pain in the ass to deal with all on my own.” His theatrical complaint only drew an unsympathetic eyeroll from her. “And then finally, after complete silence, I get messages from you crying and begging someone to come help you because you couldn't handle getting sick.”

Dark cerulean crossed her cheeks as a that recollection returned to her.  _He_ was the one she had messaged? Talk about humiliating. She sent out an ask for help hoping for it to fall on at least one sympathetic ear. And it ended up with her douchebag kismesis. Of course. 

“I was _not_ crying,” Vriska hissed venomously. Crying and begging was something only little terrified wigglers did. Not her.

“Yeah yeah, whatever,” Eridan snarked right back. “Anyway, you were lucky that I was in the middle of a campaign when I caught your message on my mobile. I finished off the pathetic competition and, once I got all their lusii for Fef, I hauled their sorry asses over here for your lusus.” He sniffed and crossed his arms. “Your lusus is a bitch, I'll tell you what. She was almost ready to eat _me_ when she saw me. Least she's no more a pain in the ass to deal with than Fef's.” He shrugged. “Anyway, then I got up here to the highest block in the top of the tallest tower like the dashing noble prince I am, and found my pathetic kismesis sprawled out on the floor in a puddle of sopor. So I hauled you up and dropped you back in your coon for you.” He showed a touch of a smarmy smirk for her benefit. “ _After_ I got a lovely new picture for my husktop wallpaper, of course.”

Vriska growled at him sharply, but then a thought struck her.

“Wait, so... you've been taking care of me all this time?” She saw him pause briefly in his movements, but he quickly stiffened up again.

“Don't go flattering yourself by reading into it, Vris. Do you know how hard it is to find a half decent kismesis among all you dirtscrapers? Even if you _are_ a land-hag spiderbitch, you at least make a servicable rival. Dualscar can't very well be reduced to scraping for a rival in anyone lesser than his age old foe, can he?” He brushed a ring-clad finger through his perfectly coiffed violet streak, while Vriska watched him with quiet contemplation. “Once you're all back to normal I hope you won't expect me to be going any easier on you. And I won't be giving you any freebie lusus feedings either once you're back on your feet.”

“... Thank you, Eridan.” He looked at her with surprise, he hadn't expected her to thank him of all things. Tired, still unhealthy, and soaked with sopor as she was, she seemed... honest about her gratitude. He turned his head to the side and deftly snatched up the tray and its contents, though the flattening of his now vaguely violet-tinted fins against his head gave a bit of a display of his emotional state.

“Whatever. You can thank me properly once you're better with a nice, properly pitch hatesnog.” He paused, and shot a bit of a smirk over his shoulder. “With that, and with the nice chunk of your treasure hoard I've taken as payment for my time and resources wasted on my ever unworthy rival.” One could almost see the spade form in her eyes when she heard he took a part of her treasure, they narrowed sharply and fiercely at him.

“You son of a- … fine, take it, then. Once I've got my strength back, I'm just going to steal it back from you, along with all if _your_ treasure. All of it.”

“I'd like to see you try.” He made his way out the door with his things, calling over his shoulder he'd be back with more medicine and some other things later. Once it was shut, and all was quiet in her block again, Vriska sighed and relaxed back into her coon and closed her eyes. The medicine was working against whatever it was she had, and the food and water she had taken in was resting comfortably in her stomach instead of threatening to be thrown back up. All in all, resting and knowing Eridan had placated her ever-hungry lusus for her, she actually felt... safe.

At least, safe as one could knowing their kismesis was the one taking care of them.

Relative safety or not, she wasn't about to waste the opportunity to gain back her strength. She let out a sigh and relaxed back into the sopor slime, letting herself drift off into a, finally, peaceful sleep.

 

**Author's Note:**

> Even when trying to write blackrom, my vacillating erivris heart can't help it. But the flushed implications are meant to be slight, so shouldn't be much I suppose.


End file.
